Free U: Visual Math

It was way past Danny's bedtime after a particularly irritating day with him. I was sitting in the kitchen with my laptop trying to get some work done. All the while, I heard bumps and thumps and waited expectantly for that voice at the top of the stairs. I was waiting for the bedtime extender du jour.

Danny is at the top of the stairs, telling his father to come and look at his car line.

"Come see my car line. It's different. It has a corner."

So up daddy goes. He comes back to down to report that Danny has indeed made a car line. He gave his father the run down:

"See, all the purple cars are here, and the orange and the blue ones. And the red cars. The green one is out of order. There was only one of those."

For years, he has been lining up his cars in various places around the house. But never like this; it was quite a meticulous line of cars to behold.

Of course, his mother had to take a picture.

So up I went to see this marvel. It really didn't matter to me that it was about an hour and a half past his bedtime and that I was in the midst of doing some editing work. I really needed at least one more positive interaction with him at the end of this particularly annoying day. And I got it.

Earlier in the day, while eating an afternoon snack, he began making patterns with the three different types of pretzels we had on hand -- sticks, twists and squares. It was his idea. Seems like patterns were on his mind that day. Maybe that's why he couldn't "hear" me to save his life.